We were only in Guìlín for one night and on advice from others and our first impressions, we wouldn't have wanted to spend more time than that. The riverside was nice
but the views were distorted by haze. We’re never sure if it's weather-induced haze or pollution.
The restaurants in Guìlín seemed to specialise in fresh meat dishes. So fresh that the meat was kept live out front which seems like a good idea in theory but in principle I’m not so sure…. The plastic bowls were filled with all sorts of seafood and fish, and the cages were full of pheasants, ducks, chickens, rabbits and these massive furry things that we suspect were giant rats.
This lady wanted to buy a chicken dish for lunch, so the rooster (in a mesh bag) was taken out of the bucket, smacked down hard once on the pavement (just as we were walking past) then weighed, squawking in a slightly subdued way. Euan kept walking, I stopped to watch and take photos. The deal was done, the lady entered the restaurant and the rooster went off to be killed and cooked.
We were laden with our packs and heading for the bus station to catch a bus to Yángshuò, about 90 minutes away from Guìlín. The driving here in China reminds me of that in Thailand. Loads of swerving, seemingly near head-on collisions, driving on the wrong side of the road, undertaking, passing on corners, incessant horn beeping and sudden heavy braking. This trip was particularly bad but it did seem that every man and his dog was on the road.
In Yángshuò it was chaos. We’re not sure which one of us decided to come to China at this time but we clearly didn’t do our research! Never, ever, if you can help it, travel in China on a national holiday – it is said that there are 780 million people on the move during national holiday week. The place was absolutely heaving. Rush hour in the City of London eat your heart out. Its nothing compared to China on holiday. The prices of accommodation were doubled and even tripled but this didn’t seem to stop the Chinese from travelling. There were very few Western tourists but seemingly (and I’m sure there actually were) millions of Chinese people. We’d booked somewhere to stay, thankfully, and did our best to escape the huge crowds but it was difficult. Again, our first job was to book onward travel but the trains and buses were all full so it was back to the planes. I have to say though, it did avoid a full two days of road/rail travel so it wasn’t a bad thing.
Yángshuò seemed pretty touristy so on our first night there we sought out an obviously local place to eat and attracted the usual stares and giggles. Ordering something for dinner was, once again, a bit of a comedy. They brought us two menus; one in Chinese and the other in both English and Chinese. After we had decided what we’d like, we pointed to the option on the Chinese/English menu but everything we pointed at was not available (indicated by a turning down of the mouth and a shake of the head). Then the menu was taken off us and, from what we could gather, it wasn’t even their menu and had stuff on it that this place didn’t even do. So, back to square one and ordering something that we only knew was going to be chicken. The dish arrived in due course and what a dish it was!! We’d seen folk at other tables eating it but we hadn’t quite appreciated the variety of its contents! It was literally one whole smashed up chicken minus the breast, thigh and leg meat but rest assured, everything else was in there though! In the below you might be able to spot legs, heart, liver, beak, head and other lovely bits and pieces.
At one point during the meal I said to Euan (who was gnawing on the beak) “do you actually know what you’re eating?” and got the prompt reply “yes, it’s the head and the wobbly bits under the beak are quite nice”. He took it out to look at it just to be sure….
The thing was, it was so damn tasty, even if there wasn’t much whole meat on there!
Yángshuò is a very picturesque place but like almost everywhere we’ve been in China, is hazy and we find it difficult to take decent photographs.
We caught a local bus about 90 minutes up the Li River to Yángdi and took a bamboo raft back down to Xingping. The scenery was pretty stunning
but a quiet relaxing ride it was not
as there was us and 100’s of others on the river. We counted at least 60 (empty) cruise boats heading back upriver to Guìlín to pick up yet more passengers and ferry them back the next morning.
There were loads of water buffalo en route and they didn't seem bothered by the river traffic. The buffalo reminded me of hippos in Africa - sometimes all you could see was the very top of their backs sticking out of the water as they were head down eating weed
We faffed around so much taking photos and looking round Xingping that we missed the last bus back to Yángshuò but were rescued by some Americans who’d chartered a mini-van and had two spare seats. We would have been in a right pickle had they not come along!
The next day we decided to head off cycling to find solitude in the countryside upriver somewhere. It took 12kms on stinky, smelly busy main roads then down rough bike tracks before we found it. Check out the car thats just undertaken the truck in the below – anything goes.
This is the point on the Yulong River where the rafts offload their passengers
before the rafts are loaded onto trucks and driven back upstream to start all over again. It was pretty manic.
While I was happily taking photos, Euan was being harassed into trying on silly hats!
Our map was crap and we got very lost so took probably twice as long as we should have to get where we were going but we did reach the point where the rafts were dumped off the trucks back into the water which was progress at least. The rafts must be quite robust as they weren’t taking much care – just sliding them off the truck to slam into the river and hit the bottom before bouncing back up and floating.
We met a water buffalo being led along the road and I could see Euan eyeing it with great suspicion and while it was a fairly hefty thing, it didn't seem fazed by much
I had better things to worry about as two wee boys, literally not far past being toddlers, had started to shout something about photo money and attach themselves to my back wheel. I started to move off, dragging them along behind me for a bit until they let go.
Upriver a bit further there was, yet again, 100s of bamboo rafts
but, about 12km out of Yángshuò we found it - space and peace.
but the views were distorted by haze. We’re never sure if it's weather-induced haze or pollution.
The restaurants in Guìlín seemed to specialise in fresh meat dishes. So fresh that the meat was kept live out front which seems like a good idea in theory but in principle I’m not so sure…. The plastic bowls were filled with all sorts of seafood and fish, and the cages were full of pheasants, ducks, chickens, rabbits and these massive furry things that we suspect were giant rats.
This lady wanted to buy a chicken dish for lunch, so the rooster (in a mesh bag) was taken out of the bucket, smacked down hard once on the pavement (just as we were walking past) then weighed, squawking in a slightly subdued way. Euan kept walking, I stopped to watch and take photos. The deal was done, the lady entered the restaurant and the rooster went off to be killed and cooked.
We were laden with our packs and heading for the bus station to catch a bus to Yángshuò, about 90 minutes away from Guìlín. The driving here in China reminds me of that in Thailand. Loads of swerving, seemingly near head-on collisions, driving on the wrong side of the road, undertaking, passing on corners, incessant horn beeping and sudden heavy braking. This trip was particularly bad but it did seem that every man and his dog was on the road.
In Yángshuò it was chaos. We’re not sure which one of us decided to come to China at this time but we clearly didn’t do our research! Never, ever, if you can help it, travel in China on a national holiday – it is said that there are 780 million people on the move during national holiday week. The place was absolutely heaving. Rush hour in the City of London eat your heart out. Its nothing compared to China on holiday. The prices of accommodation were doubled and even tripled but this didn’t seem to stop the Chinese from travelling. There were very few Western tourists but seemingly (and I’m sure there actually were) millions of Chinese people. We’d booked somewhere to stay, thankfully, and did our best to escape the huge crowds but it was difficult. Again, our first job was to book onward travel but the trains and buses were all full so it was back to the planes. I have to say though, it did avoid a full two days of road/rail travel so it wasn’t a bad thing.
Yángshuò seemed pretty touristy so on our first night there we sought out an obviously local place to eat and attracted the usual stares and giggles. Ordering something for dinner was, once again, a bit of a comedy. They brought us two menus; one in Chinese and the other in both English and Chinese. After we had decided what we’d like, we pointed to the option on the Chinese/English menu but everything we pointed at was not available (indicated by a turning down of the mouth and a shake of the head). Then the menu was taken off us and, from what we could gather, it wasn’t even their menu and had stuff on it that this place didn’t even do. So, back to square one and ordering something that we only knew was going to be chicken. The dish arrived in due course and what a dish it was!! We’d seen folk at other tables eating it but we hadn’t quite appreciated the variety of its contents! It was literally one whole smashed up chicken minus the breast, thigh and leg meat but rest assured, everything else was in there though! In the below you might be able to spot legs, heart, liver, beak, head and other lovely bits and pieces.
At one point during the meal I said to Euan (who was gnawing on the beak) “do you actually know what you’re eating?” and got the prompt reply “yes, it’s the head and the wobbly bits under the beak are quite nice”. He took it out to look at it just to be sure….
The thing was, it was so damn tasty, even if there wasn’t much whole meat on there!
Yángshuò is a very picturesque place but like almost everywhere we’ve been in China, is hazy and we find it difficult to take decent photographs.
We caught a local bus about 90 minutes up the Li River to Yángdi and took a bamboo raft back down to Xingping. The scenery was pretty stunning
but a quiet relaxing ride it was not
as there was us and 100’s of others on the river. We counted at least 60 (empty) cruise boats heading back upriver to Guìlín to pick up yet more passengers and ferry them back the next morning.
There were loads of water buffalo en route and they didn't seem bothered by the river traffic. The buffalo reminded me of hippos in Africa - sometimes all you could see was the very top of their backs sticking out of the water as they were head down eating weed
We faffed around so much taking photos and looking round Xingping that we missed the last bus back to Yángshuò but were rescued by some Americans who’d chartered a mini-van and had two spare seats. We would have been in a right pickle had they not come along!
The next day we decided to head off cycling to find solitude in the countryside upriver somewhere. It took 12kms on stinky, smelly busy main roads then down rough bike tracks before we found it. Check out the car thats just undertaken the truck in the below – anything goes.
This is the point on the Yulong River where the rafts offload their passengers
before the rafts are loaded onto trucks and driven back upstream to start all over again. It was pretty manic.
While I was happily taking photos, Euan was being harassed into trying on silly hats!
Our map was crap and we got very lost so took probably twice as long as we should have to get where we were going but we did reach the point where the rafts were dumped off the trucks back into the water which was progress at least. The rafts must be quite robust as they weren’t taking much care – just sliding them off the truck to slam into the river and hit the bottom before bouncing back up and floating.
We met a water buffalo being led along the road and I could see Euan eyeing it with great suspicion and while it was a fairly hefty thing, it didn't seem fazed by much
I had better things to worry about as two wee boys, literally not far past being toddlers, had started to shout something about photo money and attach themselves to my back wheel. I started to move off, dragging them along behind me for a bit until they let go.
Upriver a bit further there was, yet again, 100s of bamboo rafts
but, about 12km out of Yángshuò we found it - space and peace.
There was virtually no one around bar us
and people who lived there
We were still getting lost but a young chap sort of befriended us and waited for us at every junction to point us in the right direction until we made it. There were fish farms along the way – Euan is cycling through one of them
and most of the tracks we were following were dirt and led us through the rice paddies
This was our destination – Dragon Bridge, built in 1412.
Back in Yángshuò, the businesses made the most of the crowds but some of the locals just carried on as if nothing was going on at all
but on our last evening there, the 2nd October, the crowds were thinning and there were massive queues for the buses heading out of the town. Having so many people in one place is a great opportunity to meet others and we got chatting to Arleen and Rune, a couple from Norway who are living in Cambodia. An interesting couple who kindly invited us to stay with them in Cambodia – how nice is that?? They also gave us some great tips on Cambodian locations that are still unspoilt so we might have a route change ahead….
This is Julie and Emily (middle), whose hotel we stayed at in Yángshuò. Emily is only 11 but was doing all sorts to help run the hotel and was showing us how to get places, buying us bus tickets etc quite happily. Probably the most mature, independent, grown-up 11 year old I’ve ever met.
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